The 2026 Super Rugby Pacific season is the 31st season of the Super Rugby, an annual rugby union competition organised by SANZAAR between teams from Australia, Fiji, New Zealand and a combined team from Samoa, Tonga and other Pacific Island nations. It is the 30th anniversary of the competition, having been established in 1996. The fixtures were released on 28 August 2025, and features the return of Super Round in Christchurch, New Zealand.
The defending champions are the Crusaders.
Unchanged from last season (2025), eleven teams compete in a round-robin format, playing fourteen matches each (seven home, seven away), with two byes. Teams face four "rivals" twice and six others once. The top six advance to the Qualifying Finals: 1st vs 6th, 2nd vs 5th, and 3rd vs 4th. Winners and the highest-seeded losing team move to the semi-finals. Newly introduced for 2026, rather than losing one seeding rank as in the previous season, the highest-ranked losing team enters as the fourth seed, playing away in the Semi-finals, and, if they advance, in the Final.
Standings are based on competition points: four for a win, two for a draw, and none for a loss. Bonus points are awarded for scoring three or more tries than the opponent or losing by seven points or fewer.
In February 2026, just weeks before the start of the season, it was revealed that some of the existing laws pertaining to restarts, kicking/territory, rucks, and the television match official (TMO), would be amended in order to reduce stoppages, keep the ball-in-play longer, and simplify the viewing experience. The law changes, as laid out by The Sydney Morning Herald, state:
These changes were reported to have "emphatic support" amongst Super Rugby clubs, match officials and stakeholders. Sports news website Planet Rugby gave a positive assessment about law changes that give referees more discretion and help speed the game up, particularly removing the mandatory card for penalty tries, tightening the "use it" ruck law to kill caterpillars, and allowing more flexibility for quick taps. The website was critical of removing scrums for accidental offsides and tweaking the 50/22 law, arguing these risk depowering the scrum, encouraging more kicking, and pushes the sport away from its traditional balance of playing styles, and commented that "it is another example of the Australian and Kiwi bigwigs trying to limit the impact of the set-piece." The law changes were also heavily criticised by French former Test rugby referee Mathieu Raynal, whom stated to Sud Radio: "They [the Southern Hemisphere] want more passing, more tries, less time spent in mauls and scrums. Whereas we [the Northern Hemisphere] defend these specific elements and are against directions being set by the Southern Hemisphere. Our championship works, our stadiums are full, rugby is more watched than football in the country. We don't want to follow directions coming from countries where stadiums are empty, where they are trying to recreate spectacle and bring people back to stadiums at any cost..."
The table below shows each team's progression throughout the season. For each round, their cumulative points total is shown with the overall log position in brackets:
The following squads have been named. Players listed as WTG are players named in the wider training groups. Players listed as Dev are players named in development groups. Players listed in italics denote non-original squad members:
The following referees were selected to officiate the 2026 Super Rugby Pacific season: